


Jeeves and The Great Detective

by VTsuion



Series: The Mysterious Mr. Jeeves [7]
Category: Jeeves & Wooster, Jeeves - P. G. Wodehouse, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Backstory, Developing Relationship, Drama, Dysfunctional Family, M/M, Meet the Family, Pre-Relationship, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-10-24
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:34:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27180496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VTsuion/pseuds/VTsuion
Summary: Bertie Wooster has a problem, but Jeeves is all the way out in Sussex visiting one of his own aged relations. Thankfully, who better to ask for help than the great detective himself?
Relationships: Implied Established Sherlock Holmes/John Watson, Reginald Jeeves/Bertram "Bertie" Wooster
Series: The Mysterious Mr. Jeeves [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1860103
Comments: 6
Kudos: 39





	Jeeves and The Great Detective

There was no question about it, if there was ever a time for parties to rally round Bertram Wooster, it was now. I wasn’t in the soup yet, but it was looming closer every minute, and I didn’t very much like the look of my odds. The circs. were particularly gloomy on account of Jeeves, not by his presence, but by his absence. He’d had the gall to take the very day in question as his day off. He had left hours before, none the wiser, with no reason to suspect everything would go awry. Now, there was only one thing to be done; I hopped over to the Junior Ganymede and hoped for the best.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Wooster,” the girl at the desk said, “Mr. Jeeves isn’t in right now.”

“Dash it all, but where else could the man be? I don’t suppose you know where he’s gone if not here?” I insisted.

The girl was about to stammer out another apology when an older chap, the very image of a stately old butler, appeared in front of a door that he must have come through, but I could have sworn hadn't even opened a crack to admit him.

“If you’ll forgive the interruption, sir, I couldn’t help but overhear. I believe Jeeves said he would miss bridge today on account of visiting a relation of his in Sussex.”

“In Sussex? I say! Did he leave an address?”

It took a little rummaging, but between the girl and the old chappie, with a bit of help from another fellow in the other room, an address was found and I was soon speeding off into the countryside in the two-seater. It was getting on in the afternoon by the time I rolled up, past rows of those squat boxes chaps use for keeping bees, to a homey little cottage. The place wasn’t much to look at, the grounds comfortable, but not spectacular, but it seemed to be a cozy sort of place, where you might find a little old lady knitting on the couch while her husband tended the bees, or what not.

I knocked at the door and was promptly greeted not by a kindly old lady, but a stern housekeeper. She took one look at me and said, “Mr. Holmes is retired and no longer taking clients. Good day, sir.”

“Wait!” I exclaimed with a jump, as though to leap inside before she shut the door on me. “I’m looking for my man, Jeeves. I was told he’d be here.”

Her demeanor changed in an instant, though she didn’t quite smile at me as she waved me inside. “Why didn’t you say so? I’m sorry, sir, I assumed you were here to see Mr. Holmes. He gets more visitors asking him to hear ‘just one more case’ than a man can very well bear.”

I nodded sympathetically.

She led me in, to a little sitting room situated at the front of the house that looked out on the rows of beehives through a wide window. And sitting by that window was a tall, thin old man, leaning back rather luxuriously in his chair, eyeing me with a distinctly piercing gaze. Jeeves had presumably been sitting in the chair across from him, but by the time I came into the room, he was standing at attention, as though to welcome me back into our flat back in the metrop.

I greeted them both with a cheery, “What ho!”

“Mr. Wooster, I presume,” the old bird said with a thin, but laughing smile. “I perceive you’ve come here in quite a hurry by way of Cuzon street. Lunch didn’t go to plan?”

“No, it dashed well didn’t!” I stopped as I realized what the chap had said. “How did you know all that?”

“My apologies, Mr. Wooster, I am afraid that old habits die hard. I should introduce myself; I am Sherlock Holmes. I suppose I could be called Jeeves’s uncle.”

At the sound of the chap’s name, my mouth unhinged itself and hung open, absolutely agog, I mean aghast. Sherlock Holmes let out a sharp laugh at my expression.

When I had at last partially regained my senses, enough so to speak, I blurted out, “ _ You’re _ Bunny’s rich uncle?”

Bunny, you see, is Jeeves’s cousin, and the former accomplice of the famous cricketer and infamous gentleman thief, A.J. Raffles, but Bunny tells that whole story better than I possibly could. No longer able to live off of ill-gotten gains, he has occasionally mentioned a rich uncle upon whom he is unable to call.

“In a manner of speaking,” Sherlock Holmes answered with a dismissive wave, no less amused. “Mycroft and I both fill the part, though he’s rather less sociable than even myself.”

“You’re  _ the _ Sherlock Holmes? The great detective?” I asked, just to be sure, though I really shouldn’t have been surprised that a remarkable chap like Jeeves was related to the brainiest cove of them all. “Jeeves said his family doctor was  _ the _ Dr. Watson, but he seemed like such an ordinary chap.”

Sherlock Holmes smiled. “Yes, I am he. As for the good doctor, I could not call Watson’s unassuming modesty a virtue; it’s as much a departure from the truth as my own occasional overconfidence.”

The chap sure sounded like Sherlock Holmes. What the nephew of a man like him was doing working for a chap like me was beyond my comprehension, but it doesn’t do to look a gift Jeeves in the mouth - a rather uncomfortable maneuver for all involved really.

Instead, I exclaimed, “Rather! What are you doing out away from the metrop.? Working on a case, what?”

“No,” Sherlock Holmes said, though I thought he may have sounded a little wistful, “I found that it was time to retire triumphantly rather than wait for my career to end of its own accord.”

“You mean to say you’ve retired?” I rather yelped.

“Yes,” he replied simply.

“But Dr. Watson is still working in London, or is he here too?” I glanced around, half expecting the old doctor to materialize from around the corner.

“No, Watson has elected to remain in London for the time being. His practice is a busy one after all.”

“But-!” I hesitated, realizing I was coming awfully close to prying. I know I barely knew the chap; I had met Dr. Watson all of twice and I didn’t really know Sherlock Holmes at all. But I had a rummy sort of sinking feeling about it all, that of course Dr. Watson wasn’t there; a brainy cove like Sherlock Holmes didn’t need a fellow like Dr. Watson following him around, just like Jeeves didn’t really need a fellow like me.

I stammered out, “Well, I always assumed- from the stories it seemed you were such great chums, that unpublished story Dr. Watson gave me especially.”

Sherlock Holmes chuckled. “Watson told me he saw fit to share his account of that case with you. That much of his stories is true; Watson is the dearest friend I have ever known and I have the fortune to be a valued companion to him in return, but there are some things even I cannot do.”

I wasn’t sure I very much liked the sound of that either, but Sherlock Holmes quickly and decisively redirected the conversation.

Now,” he said, “Mr. Wooster, what is it that brings you to my humble cottage in such a hurry?”

I had entirely forgotten my troubles in all the excitement of meeting Sherlock Holmes, and now they came rushing back. “I was looking for Jeeves,” I explained with a glance at the man, standing still and silent as a statue throughout the exchange. “I’m not in the soup yet, but it looms, Jeeves, and I hope you’ve been eating plenty of fish because I’m afraid it will take all your brains to get the y. m. out of this one!”

“Do, take a seat,” Sherlock Holmes instructed with a gracious wave. “Perhaps Jeeves and I can shed a little light upon your problem.”

“Rather!” I exclaimed, hastily sitting down across from him. “I mean, I’m certain it’s nothing compared to what you must be accustomed to, but it’s deep stuff to me. Jeeves, you might as well pull up a chair; if ever there was a time to flock ‘round, this would be it.”

“Very good, sir.”

Jeeves did indeed pull up a chair, and Sherlock Holmes motioned for me to begin as though I was a client who had come to consult at Baker Street. I cast about, suddenly at a loss of where to begin in front of such an attentive audience.

“Well, it’s like this,” I attempted. “I suppose I ought to start at the beginning. I’m engaged you see, to Natalie Fletcher. She’s a woman among women and all that rot, but her family isn’t too keen on Bertram W. That’s where I was at lunch just before I came here, trying to give her old man a bit of olive oil and what not, but Jeeves, it was an absolute catastrophe!”

“Indeed, sir.”

There was something rummy, awfully soupy, I mean, in the man’s tone that I’d noticed whenever I mentioned my intended. He’d been the same about Bobbie Wickham until the kibosh had been put on that, but unlike Bobbie, who, to be fair, would never give a fellow a quiet moment if he took her to the altar, Nat was beyond reproach.

“Jeeves, I said, “Nat is beyond reproach. What could you possibly have against her?”

“If I may speak freely, sir?”

“Speak away, Jeeves.”

“I do not believe Miss Fletcher would be a suitable match for you, sir.”

“Jeeves, I can’t abide this. She’s a gentle, easy-going soul, not the least bit soupy, with a fine profile besides. I haven’t heard a word against her. She’s exactly the sort of girl a chap ought to want to marry.”

“I am afraid she would not be suitable, sir. Her neck is much too long.”

“Pish! I say pish, Jeeves!” I repeated for emphasis. “I say that she is beyond reproach. Will you object to any girl I choose to marry?”

“I cannot say, sir.”

“Dash it all, Jeeves!”

At this point, Sherlock Holmes cut in, rather like a judge overseeing a courtroom that had gotten a bit rowdy, “Unless you have some serious objection, Jeeves, if Mr. Wooster desires to marry Miss Fletcher or any other woman, it would not be right to stand in his way.” He spoke with a sort of casual delicacy, but I thought I detected something of a more severe undercurrent.

“Rather!” I exclaimed, ready to assert my authority over my man. “I mean, I’ll have to marry someone eventually, what?”

“Not necessarily,” Sherlock Holmes cautioned.

“Not necessarily? You mean never get married? I say, my Aunt Agatha would never let me hear the end of it. Why, it would be almost as bad as running away with a showgirl like my cousin Gussie. She sent me all the way to America after him to try and dissuade him and I couldn’t show my face back in England for months afterward, it was such a flop.”

“Mr. Wooster, do you truly wish to marry Miss Fletcher?”

“Why shouldn’t I?” I asked indignantly.

“It’s not a question of whether you should, but whether you do. If so, I have only to offer my congratulations, but, Mr. Wooster” - here the chap hesitated, and his tone took on a rummy sort of seriousness - “do not forget that you will be wed for as long as you both do live. It’s not a thing to be entered into hastily.”

“Bingo got married after knowing the girl for less than a week and he and the missus couldn’t be happier - a few hiccoughs aside.”

I heard a quiet cough, like a sheep on a distant mountaintop, and we both turned our attention to Jeeves. “If I may take the liberty, sir, Mr. Little’s marital bliss aside, I do not believe that you would be happy if you married Miss Fletcher or any other. Mr. Holmes, I am under the impression that, like yourself, Mr. Wooster is one of nature’s bachelors.”

“What do you mean by that?” I demanded.

Sherlock Holmes seemed more amused by it all. “I believe Jeeves alludes to the fact that I have never had any desire to marry and am none the worse for it.”

I couldn’t help but ask, “Not even Irene Adler?”

He dismissed the suggestion outright.

“Anyway,” I insisted, getting back on track, “marriage can’t be as bad as all that, what?”

“Forgive me for saying so, sir,” Jeeves said, “but the married life would not suit you.”

“You’re talking rot, Jeeves! It wouldn’t be so different, what? We’d need a bigger flat, of course, but Nat isn’t such bad company, and we’d hire a governess to look after the little blisters. I hear Nat has a pretty lady’s maid, I’m sure you’d get along swimmingly.”

“Sir,” Jeeves interjected rather gravely, “it is a policy of mine to never work for a married man.”

That simple declaration of Jeeves’s stopped me short. I could have sworn I nearly heard a thump as my heart seemed to drop out of my chest and hit the floor. Of course, Jeeves had mentioned this peculiarity of his before, but it had never truly registered that the chap really meant it.

“You really mean that, Jeeves?” I asked.

“I am afraid so, sir.”

“What about all that ‘tie that binds’ rot?”

He seemed to hesitate. Of course, I never really believed that the chap would work for me  _ forever _ . Eventually a brainy cove like him would inevitably tire of Bertram W. and seek higher things, but I didn’t think a silly little thing like marriage would be the thing that broke whatever tie it was that bound us.

“Sir, I do not believe that marriage would suit you.”

“Jeeves,” Sherlock Holmes said sharply, “this decision is for Mr. Wooster and the woman he wishes to marry to make alone.”

“No, it’s all right,” I said. Jeeves had given me a rather lot to think about, and I had little doubt I would mull it over all the way home and then some. All I knew then was that all of a sudden, Nat wasn’t looking nearly so rosy.

Sherlock Holmes regarded me with his famously keen gaze. His eyes certainly felt like they could uncover any secret I dared hide from the chap. I couldn’t say what it was he was searching for, but after a moment or two he seemed to find something that settled the matter well enough, and we all turned to other things.

Eventually, Jeeves and I stood to take our leave. Sherlock Holmes followed suit to shake our hands and bid us farewell.

I was already most of the way out the door, but Jeeves lingered a little on the threshold. “Mr. Holmes, I will convey your greetings to Dr. Watson.”

Sherlock Holmes waved it off. “Thank you, Jeeves, but Watson is a busy man, he needn’t be troubled about a retired old man like me.”

“I believe Dr. Watson will be very pleased to hear from you,” Jeeves replied, as though he’d only heard half of the words Sherlock Holmes had said.

“Very well,” Sherlock Holmes said airily. To my surprise, he turned to me with something of a conspiratorial glint. “Jeeves has a way of always managing to get whatever he wants, against which one must be careful to guard.”

“Bunny told me it’s always been like that,” I said.

“Yes, I imagine so. Jeeves has possessed such a talent for as long as I have known him.”

“That is very kind of you, Mr. Holmes.” Jeeves said not quite graciously.

To Jeeves, Sherlock Holmes imparted a pointed word of advice, as any aged relative seems compelled to do, “Be careful that you do not take it for granted.”

“Indeed,” Jeeves replied, his tone a measure more soupy than respectful, but Sherlock Holmes made no objection.

At last, I bid Sherlock Holmes, “Toodle-pip,” and then Jeeves and I hopped back into the two-seater, bound for home.

**Author's Note:**

> Wooster met Raffles and Bunny in [Jeeves and the Amateur Cracksman](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25655242). He met Dr. Watson in [Jeeves Gets Sick](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26798197), the doctor makes another appearance in [Jeeves Meets the Phantom of the Opera](), and he meets Mycroft Holmes in [Jeeves and the British Government]().


End file.
